


The Scholar

by marisadelamare



Category: His Dark Materials (TV), His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
Genre: Dust (His Dark Materials), F/F, Fanfiction, His Dark Materials Inspired, Sapphic, Will's World (His Dark Materials), angry marisa coulter, hdm s2e05, marysa, sad angry sex, slightly nsfw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:47:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28095657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marisadelamare/pseuds/marisadelamare
Summary: The Scholar AU; the day Marisa met Doctor Mary Malone, Lyra didn’t show up at Boreal’s. She would, on the next day or so, but, in the meanwhile, Marisa was still way too angry to put up with that man. She goes for a late night walk and finds a curious Mary approaching a hornbeam.
Relationships: Marisa Coulter & Mary Malone, Marisa Coulter/Mary Malone
Comments: 11
Kudos: 57





	The Scholar

**Author's Note:**

> notes in the end :)

A headache from being close to a period was, the formidable Mrs. Coulter found, an excuse that would never fail to a man, much less to a shallow one, interest only in what was done better free of blood. It had worked with Carlo Boreal before and, now, it was working again.

What she had also found, that she did even earlier, was that having a Golden Monkey as a soul meant you could easily climb down a window, fall standing on the ground, although sometimes she wished she was a cat as it would make her more subtle in that. But, as a _lady_ , she managed to quiet down her noises. She escaped the house through the back, escaping the lens that captured the moving images at the front. The Golden Monkey was right behind her this time, as it was almost three in the morning and as she verified, the streets were deserted. She didn’t want to be with him, yes, but that didn’t mean she wanted complete loneliness. Not that she would dare lay her eyes at the small companion at her feet.

So she walked, in those ridiculously uncomfortable hills that she now questioned too, feeding the hatred for every single man who ever told her off and for herself for not being _arrogant_ enough, _impertinent_ enough or even _intelligent_ enough to break as free as the women in that new reality did. They must have had to fight, mustn’t they? Could there be a world where men simply didn’t presume themselves as superior and abused their strength till everyone thought the same?

That was too much to picture.

But so was that redhead doctor, dressing like a man with shoes she had never seen before, with knowledge and technology beyond Marisa’s wildest techno dreams just laying at her table, waiting to be used and reused and devoured with the famish for knowledge that woman exhibited facing the unknown — a woman from a field she never heard of, that shouldn’t even exist there, and from another world, even though she probably didn’t know that.

That woman wasn’t even wearing a wedding ring.

How could that and her own dull, outrageously retrograde world coexist?

Before she could begin to answer that for herself, she saw a copper glisten under the streetlight across the street and felt herself hold her breath, as the monkey hid behind a bush.

_What in hell is she doing here?_

Almost as soon as that thought hit her mind, the woman noticed her. She narrowed her eyes, just to make sure she was seeing it right, and Mrs. Coulter’s expression went cold and ghostly from an unspeakable fright — for her soul in the bushes and for her terribly unpredictable state of mind. Her belly froze as the woman came closer.

“Ma- Mrs. Coulter?” Asked Mary, almost forgetting her manners in front of the highly sophisticated woman, who seemed only a little bit less threatening without the top of her suit over the cherry pink blouse.

“Marisa is fine.” She responded with a grin, unsure why she’d do that. She was defensive, but also flirty, and asked herself if she could be trying to deal with the woman as she would have dealt with a man. She knew women who could be worked that way, but the point was to get the woman to move along and that wasn’t the best way in any scenario. She was still holding her breath. All that could be seen from the monkey was the light glim from his dark brown eyes between the leaves.

‘Oh, alright. Then you, too, can call me Mary.” She answered, but then thought herself stupid for it since it wasn’t asked of her to say anything about it. As she took a closer look, the rigid woman almost seemed nervous. Instantly, her gaze became investigative. “What are you doing here?”

“Well, the friends me and Lyra are staying with live nearby. I thought I’d take a walk. What are _you_ doing here?” She mastered the lie, as it wasn’t entirely one, but the question was a bit more inquisitive than planned. Still, nothing that couldn’t be managed.

“I… Well, it would sound weird. You wouldn’t believe me.” Unless she really needed to, Mary was a terrible liar. She would try to brush subjects off, but to lie about them was often a challenge. So, she hoped for that to be enough.

“Try me.” Answered Mrs. Coulter, in all her curiosity, knowing that wasn’t really the expected answer from the Doctor’s painfully obvious dry swallow.

Mary felt on her voice there would be no point on avoiding the answer, and thought, too, about how weirdly tense she still seemed. And had seemed before. And about how Lyra said she was from another… World. Another world. She felt something click in her brain, and it felt only right to answer truthfully. And so, she did. “Angels” but then, maybe she didn’t know precisely what it was. “Dark Matter. Yours and Lyra’s Dust. It told me to find something, I went looking for it and ended up here.”

Marisa’s eyes glimmered brighter than the yellowish streetlight or the moon above them as she heard those worlds, and the air she held in was slowly released. As calm and put together as that may have seemed, the Monkey immediately jumped out of the bushes, scaring the living shit out of Mary Malone.

“What the hell?” she jumped back, looking at him and at the woman in front of her, standing still and looking at him.

As she had done so many times in front of others’ eyes, Marisa bent her body lightly, letting the monkey climb up her arm. He hanged from her back, looking fiercely at Mary from up her shoulder. The woman took a deep breath. “I imagine Lyra told you we are not from… Here.” She started and continued as the other woman nodded shakily. “Well, where we’re from, things… Work a little different. He’s my… Counterpart, one could say. But it would look weird to carry a monkey around here, so I left him when I went to see you earlier. But I didn’t expect to see anyone here this late.” The last phrase was the first time she sounded hostile towards Mary in that exchange, but she didn’t flinch while doing so.

And Mary noticed it and thought about what kind of relationship one must have with their counterpart for it to be the one sensible thing for that woman that looked carved in stone. “So… It’s safe, right?” She asked, trying not to sound scared.

“Mostly.” Marisa responded and sounded honest, which she was. But she was also even more defensive and was eager to leave. Although, she was also eager to find out more about Mary’s work and if that intrigued look from her went on, she would make sure she saw through everything the redhead could have to tell, too.

“Very well,” Responded Mary, “Good. Great. Um… Another world, hm? Wow.” She recomposed herself, looking as if she was processing the information. She wasn’t. She needed a drink and to know absolutely everything about that woman and her counterpart monkey and whatever tales they had to tell, even if they didn’t seem very open to talking. From a sudden burst of courage, she asked: “Would you be free for a drink?”

“A drink? Now?” Marisa frowned, and thought that maybe that was a woman who could be worked as a man. But she seemed very different than a man, as were most of the women she worked, but those women were the same and this one seemed different from them too. Something seemed off. But different was… Inviting, to say the least, and curiosity seemed to bring them together as magnets in a weirdly familiar way, but with a very different sense of danger. But the last thing she wanted to think about was Asriel, so she decided to make that same mistake again. “Yes, I would have a drink.”

“Great!” Mary smiled, excited, trying not to sound too childish as she sometimes did. “Great, okay. My car is right around the corner, we could go to my place, is that good with you? There aren’t many good places open now and I think that little guy would be more comfortable in private. Also, I have great wine.” She said, referring to the monkey, making herself sound casual, as if that was something she was used to doing. None of that was. It all seemed like a weird situation that she shouldn’t let slide. She was also trying hard not to stare, too, but failing on that part. The duo was impossible not to look at, and she gathered that the effect wasn’t exclusive to the ones unfamiliar with the dynamic. How could someone with such atmosphere be ignored?

Almost excited, too, but mostly reprehending her own reckless behavior, Mrs. Coulter smiled. “I love wine.”

So Mary took the lead, and led the woman to her car and apologized for the mess of books in the backseat as the monkey got in first and made room for himself among her papers, looking through them with surprising discretion as his person gave a slight grin, getting into the car, front seat, as to take the seemingly unnecessary apology.

The drive was silent, but Marisa’s eyes wandered through every inch of that world. Memorized the architectonic differences and how the streets barely looked the same. She hadn’t said anything, but she was anything but quiet inside. Mary looked at her and her counterpart through the mirror constantly, and memorized her face and clothes and singular manners and everything that explained her lack of presence that was so hard to miss at the same time, and everything that made her other-worldly and so obviously so. And they spoke without the sound of a word, and both overanalyzed whatever they could from anything they could lay their eyes on.

As they got to Mary’s home, she got down and made her way to the other side of the car, opening the door to Marisa before the woman could take unfasten her seatbelt. Marisa wasn’t expecting it, but saw it coming as she observed the other woman’s way and smiled grateful as she and the monkey got off, running her hands over her clothes out of habit. Mary smiled and took the lead again, knowing she’d be followed, and took her shoes off as she got in because she had stepped in dirt and Marisa, unsure of how the habit worked, did the same. Mary had that reaction as a theory of hers that had just been proven — the theory that Marisa was an instinctive survivor and knew what she was doing to blend in even if it was impossible to do so — and smiled slightly. She locked the door and went further in.

She got the glasses, the more expensive bottle of wine she owned, something to open it and poured it for them both, assuming a monkey wouldn’t drink. She was right. She handed Marisa the glass.

“Thank you.” She said in response, looking around. The monkey was quietly exploring, careful not to be too obvious about it. She looked at the woman and they smiled at each other and drank.

And they drank for a while, got to the couch, and talked and talked more and more as neither was immune to alcohol, even though they were both being even more careful than usual. Even though they knew things for different names, to different extents and in different ways, they understood each other and felt like so. Marisa was surprised to learn Mary had been a nun and even more to learn nuns could leave the convent there.

“Well, here, when you become a nun, it’s like… There are postulants, for the first six months. Then we take temporary vows, get two years through the novitiate, and then the actual vows. They say we’re getting married to God, there was this special habit in my order for when we took the vows. It looked quite like a wedding dress. But, well, as for any marriage, we can always just get a divorce. That’s what I did.” Mary explained, and then drank a bit more.

Marisa raised her eyebrows. “You can just… Get a divorce? As simple as that? Out of the blue?”

Mary frowned. “You can’t?”

Marisa was quiet for a while, having the same angry impulse she had at the college to find a way to run away and think about smashing the car as she went back home. But she didn’t have a car, nor did she know how to walk back home. So, after some time, she finally answered with a contained ironic smile. “I barely had a say in marrying someone or not. The best I could do was to make the marriage useful, which didn’t work for long as I was never one to be so… Well, submissive.”

“Yeah, you absolutely do not seem like the type.” Mary answered, in a small laugh, and wanted to ask what went down but didn’t know if she should. So, instead, she drank again.

Marisa gave her a grin that was impossible to read, accompanied by a gaze made for making anyone shiver under it. “Are you?” She asked, curiously. “The submissive type.”

The question made Mary hesitate, as she wasn’t quite sure how to respond. After some thinking, she went for a joke. “Not if I can help it.”, and a smile.

Marisa smiled too. “Can you help it, usually?”

“Mostly, yes.” Mary answered, and her smile became a curious semi-open mouth.

“Good.” She said. “You shouldn’t submit.”

But maybe out of pride, maybe out of way too much tension, maybe because Marisa knew she would never see the woman again, she replied “You better get going with it, then, before I change my mind.”

With a light smile, setting her own back straight, Mary let go of her wrists slowly. She kissed her again as to do what the woman had seemed to enjoy and unbuttoned the rest of her blouse. When she tried to take it off, Marisa stopped her. “Keep it on.” She said, and she wasn’t asking. It was undeniably a demand, and undeniable.

“Alright, darling.” Mary responded, lightly. She had assumed the woman had a hard time with not being in control and that proved her right. Not only that, made her notice how much she wanted to make her comfortable. So, she let the blouse on, but touched her under it and pulled her closer.

Closer, Marisa, who wasn’t one to give up so easily, locked their lips again and took immediate control over it. She ran her hands over the woman’s body with possession, unsure if she wanted to convince her of something or just to feel what she was up against — physical strength, capacity to dominate, instincts, awareness of surroundings, how fast she could think, anything one would want to now about their opponent. But Mary wasn’t a threat, not really, no matter what her gut had to say about anyone who came too close. And the Monkey knew that, laying down at ease under de table, still backwards, feeling Mary’s undeniable, inevitable tenderness. Marisa felt his easiness and lost her grip for a moment, breaking the kiss as if to try and analyze whatever she had gotten herself into. Something just didn’t seem right, although everything was.

Mary let her get back, giving her time, watching silently while she finished undoing her hair. Once it was on her shoulders, she delicately caressed her neck and kissed her lips, then moved closer to her ear. “Let go, love… Just let go.” She asked, softly.

Marisa felt her body tense up, but her insides melted to the sound of the term she hadn’t been called in years, and never wanted to be again. “Don’t call me that, please.” She asked, in a whisper, sounding both defensive and loose. She bit the inside of her cheek, using the pain to think straight, but all she heard was a low voice like a thin stream of smoke reply “ _Whatever you like, darling._ ” Next thing she knew, she was bending back to the feeling of Mary’s lips on her neck. She let her unbutton her own trousers, which they pulled down just enough before opening her bra, which, luckily, had its opening at the front. That little was enough for Marisa to be even more on the lookout than normal.

But Mary’s touch was precise, subtle, certain, tender, and she could feel her caring as one of her hands traced a line under the coverage of her back. Marisa kept her hands by the sides of her waist, caressing cautiously and unlike Mary’s, her touch was rather rough and subtly violent, as if threat was an inherently natural part of her and it was. To some extent, it was. But she was also naturally gracious and handled the woman as such, as she felt one of her hands go down between her legs.

At first, the freezing cold fingers made her shiver as to let a contact like that happen so freely wasn’t usual for her, not at all. Much less from someone so interested in pleasing rather than being pleased, whose lips were going down on her at the same time. She felt sharp teeth go through her skin and the hair on her arms and thighs stood on end, and Mary noticed and bit her quick and easy, as a test. Marisa took a deep breath. “If you’re going to bite me, do it right.” She said, in a low voice and as a command, and Mary smiled as if she liked that. Marisa led her head so her mouth would find the right spot between her shoulder and neck, and that was something she hadn’t let almost anyone do to her. Only one person had been authorized to hurt her like that. But, if she wanted to get something from that moment, that had to be a part of it and that much she knew for sure. And Mary followed her command, biting as hard as it took for Marisa to let a low, hoarse moan slid from between her lips.

Release for the tension.

As that happened, Mary kept going down and her fingers, until then tracing lines on the woman’s inner thighs, then up until she started stimulating her softly. Marisa closed her eyes, but her senses were completely aware of anything happening under the dim light from the room darkened by the deep night. She felt the stimulation and let it play out carefully, the same with those lips who were now exploring her breasts, as Mary’s free hand was being used for support on the back of the couch.

As it played out, Mary knew exactly what she was doing, and Marisa didn’t necessarily expect that or to be so comfortable that she would let a moan that didn’t come from pain slide. She did, though, and reprehended herself for it immediately. Mary noticed, and made her way up to her ear again. “I told you to let go,” she said, “and I want to hear you.” Marisa was angry at her, but she had been from the moment she laid her eyes on her, so it hardly made a difference. Even so, her hands turned to hold Mary’s waist more fiercely. She didn’t answer.

Following the feeling of Mary’s breathing on her skin, she knew another bite was on the way. And she should have known, as the support hand went down, it would come at the same time as

the sliding of two fingers inside her, and even stronger than before.

Marisa held her own breath, but a surprised moan came out anyway. She moved her hips, as to make her fingers aim for the right spot as they pounded deep, precise, too slow. But the stimulation on the outside was growing faster and the burning sensation of her teeth was doing its job and Marisa carved her nails on her in anger for she was making it hard for her to hate her as she didn’t even know she wanted to. Low, light moans came out of her mouth as Mary’s fingers grew in their velocity, and then in quantity. Now, three were in and the outs of it were the harder to cope properly. Marisa held her closer, carved her nails deeper, felt her neck bend and found difficulty in keeping still almost as much as in keeping quiet, and she was usually almost unable to fail at both.

She looked up, away, wherever she could, and felt the weight on her chest and the climax made itself closer to them. She scratched Mary’s back, pulling her against herself, and became more violent, as she was being forced to let go of control, than it would be expected from a woman with such posture, and Mary understood why her counterpart was a monkey.

It didn’t took much longer, or it didn’t feel as long as it had been, for Marisa to feel her whole body tense up to the most of its ability — and its abilities were almost implacable at first sight — and cursed in a whisper as she felt the urge to let herself come undone, as much as it was against most of her nature and will. She held it inside her for as long as it could, feeling the compressed fingers of the doctor inside her, the freezing belly and the painful nod on her throat, which she had been ignoring for a while. And she tried to keep herself together while not even close to keeping still, as a challenge, as a punishment, as a treat, and her thoughts became as violently fast as the rocking of her hips and she was obliged by biology and everything corporeal and spiritual to obey, to comply, to _let go_ , and it was far more painful than expected and much more of a relief than planned. She held Mary as closely to herself as she could, her voice barely audible as she moaned in a much higher pitched way than she had until then and Mary let her. Mary just let her and stayed inside her until it felt safe to leave.

Once Marisa’s grip went soft, Mary left her lap, taking her hand with her, and licked her fingers to clean them up. She never really saw a point in that, but always found it funny and did as a joke to self. But as she looked back at Marisa, drying her fingers on her trousers, the woman was drying under her eyes as quickly as she could with the backs of her hands. Mary’s smile wavered to that sight, unsure of what it meant. But it was, she thought, supposed to be a good thing. It usually was, psychologically speaking. And that was what she told herself as she rationalized it and watched her finish the glass of wine, looking a way.

What she noticed, after that, was that the woman would leave, and she didn’t want her to. What she knew about how to keep her there was what she would, surely, want to see.

Mary finished her own glass and hoped it would be enough. “Would you like to se my work, Marisa?” She asked.

Marisa’s eyes, glimmering with held back tears, immediately lightened back up. She swallowed whatever mess that was and buttoned her blouse up again, pulled up her trousers and put her hair back up. After a discrete deep breath, not even once looking at the Monkey, who was holding his knees to his chest, she turned to Mary and smiled.

“I would love to, Mary.”

**Author's Note:**

> hey! if you got this far, thank you for reading it! this is the first thing i've posted here so sorry for possible bad english or formating, still learning how to make html work and english isn't my first language. if you have any thoughts, please let me hear them! and thanks again!


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